1. Technical Field
Embodiments relate to a photo spinner apparatus and wafer carrier loading/unloading method using the same.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, semiconductor devices are manufactured in several steps, including repeated forming of semiconductor circuits on a wafer. These steps may include, e.g., growth and deposition process of layer material, coating of a photoresist, photolithography process for masking corresponding semiconductor circuits on the photoresist, etching process of removing a portion not corresponding to semiconductor circuits, and/or ion implantation of impurities in respective processes, etc. In the photolithography process a photo spinner apparatus is mainly used to apply and develop the photoresist.
In such photo spinner apparatus, a decrease in productivity may result when the loading/unloading time of wafer carrier by an automatic carrier device is too large. This causes the photolithography process equipment to sit idle, decreasing productivity.
Furthermore, about five wafer carriers may be horizontally arrayed by increasing the surface area of the wafer carrier loader. But, an increase in the surface area of the wafer carrier loader to handle larger wafers may result in a larger semiconductor production line, which may decrease productivity.